18th
Consistent Compassion :: Michael Vick and Guantanamo Bay
This is old news by now, but something that somehow has remained on a simmering boil—something that will spill over again at the next botched PR glitch.
As you know, Michael Vick is out of prison and will soon be lacing up his cleats to get back on the football field.
I know folks who are furious about this. They think what he did to dogs was unimaginable and feel that the consequences to those actions should exclude him from public life.
I know folks who are cheering for him and his second chance. They think he served his time and accepted his punishment, now he should be free to move on.
Personally, I don’t have a strong opinion (first time I’ve ever said that…) either way. I think our culture treats professional athletes like “big boys” who are expected to act up a little, sometimes be poor sports or taunt their opponents, and we pay them a disproportional amount of crazy cash to play games. However, I’m a huge fan of college sports because, most of them who won’t get a pro job, the student athletes play for the love of the game, not a paycheck and, because they have to balance the demands of athletics with the rest of their lives.
Anyway, back to Michael Vick’s lovers and his haters.
What I’m still confused about is the outrage that the American people had when we discovered Michael Vick was involved in dog fighting. Sure, it’s horrible. It’s cruel and demented. It’s concerning that anyone would foster such a blood-thirsty perversion for entertainment.
But the outrage in the media and among the people, reeked with an inconsistency that I’m still trying to understand.
About the same time Michael Vick was all over the news, there was something happening even worse than dog fighting, something that we somehow buried in the news. It took place in a little facility that is called Guantanamo Bay. Torture. Hurting real live human beings. Some of them were even kids.
Most of us weren’t very moved. Not many of us were outraged and disgusted. A lot of us spent our compassion on the suffering of Vick’s dogs, forgetting the about sons, husbands and fathers who were being degraded, humiliated and assaulted in violation of international law.
Did we really show more compassion for dogs than people?
What happened there was a betrayal of power and authority, a betrayal of trust. Even worse, it was an assault on the image of God as imprinted in humanity, an assault on the likeness of our Creator.
It’s horrible. It’s cruel and demented. It’s concerning that there are people who can order, approve and condone this kind of activity.
Look, I can understand if you are upset that Michael Vick is given a second chance. I get it. No one wants to hear about someone hurting animals. I understand that he did some pretty messed up things to dogs. It’s pretty jacked-up.
But let’s at least be consistent. Let’s show the same outrage when human beings are treated worse than dogs.
Animal rights are important, but let’s not forget that we also need to generate some passion around human rights.
Let’s also allow ourselves to be upset that there are folks under our government’s “care” who have been treated like animals and hurt in unspeakable ways.
Let’s show some consistent compassion. Even for our enemies. Especially for our enemies. For they are among the select few that Christ actually asked us to show love to.
